Schools To Settle Suit For $600,000

Woman Says Principals Chosen By Their Gender

The Orange County School Board agreed Wednesday to pay a woman administrator $600,000 to settle her claim that gender kept her from getting her dream job as a high school principal.

Lawyers for Bonnie King, a former assistant principal at Boone and Colonial high schools in Orlando, said they could show she was passed over unfairly for more than 80 positions in the school district over the past six years.

In settling the case, the district admitted no wrongdoing and agreed to keep King in an administrative job, but the lawsuit raises a larger question of whether districts favor men over women when seeking leaders of today's complicated high schools.

Across Central Florida, woman principals dominate the lower grades, but men command more than three-quarters of the high schools. Although 110 of Orange County's 159 principals are women, they lead just four of the county's 16 high schools.

"They never said women aren't capable, but the implication was there," King said Wednesday. She has worked for the district for 33 years.

Her chief counsel, Bernard H. Dempsey Jr., described her treatment as "a residual of what they call the good ol' boys system."

School officials differ, however, on whether such a system exists.

When Osceola County hired a principal for Gateway High last month, a man was the only applicant. Just two people -- a man and a woman -- applied for the current vacancy at Celebration High. Osceola is now re-advertising for that position.

It's tough to get applicants for high school principals, even with the higher pay and prestige that goes with the job, said Jim DiGiacomo, the Osceola deputy superintendent who oversees principal hiring. Fewer women apply, he said.

"If we had a competent female walk in the door, I'm sure we'd snap her up," DiGiacomo said. "That would include for a high school position."

Others say that men are favored for principal positions in high schools.

"Any time you're a woman and in secondary administration, there is a sense that you have to prove yourself," said D. Elise Gruber, assistant principal at South Seminole Middle School in Casselberry.

Gruber spent four years as principal at Winter Springs High School, but only after spending two years as principal at the middle-school level. She asked to return to middle school this school year so she could spend more time with her family.

"I had to prove myself at middle school first," she said. "I don't know any other male high school principal that had to be a middle school principal first."

Wednesday's settlement canceled what lawyers predicted would be a month-long sex-discrimination trial in Orlando's federal court. Although the agreement carried no admission of guilt, King and her attorneys said they hope it will change the way the school district makes personnel decisions.

"There's everything to be said for picking the best person for a job and not picking the favorite," Dempsey said.

Orange County officials insist that their selection process is fair. Superintendent Ron Blocker said King's discrimination charges seem easily refuted, given that more than two-thirds of Orange's principals are women, and so is about 80 percent of his "executive team."

That team, a group of the district's highest-ranking administrators, recommends principal candidates to Blocker.

James G. Brown, the district's lawyer in the case, said the School Board was prepared to go to trial, but its insurance company thought that paying a settlement would be less expensive than a month-long ordeal in court. "The School Board wanted to try it," he said. "We believed it was meritless."

King, 55, who has a doctorate and two master's degrees, was made director of grant services last year, a position she applied for after filing her lawsuit. With the job came a $7,000 raise.

"Is that how we retaliate against people?" Brown said.

King said she was pleased with her grants job and with the settlement, 40 percent of which goes to her lawyers. Still, she laments that she'll never be a high school principal. Her agreement bars her from applying for another job with the Orange County School District. She plans to retire in 2007.